A weekend visit home to Tucson that included a reunion with staff members, Father's Day breakfast and Mexican takeout food was good medicine for Rep. Gabrielle Giffords as she recovers from being shot, her astronaut husband said.

Rep. Gabrielle Giffords' recovery isn't slowing down while her astronaut husband speeds around the Earth.

Giffords will undergo surgery Wednesday so doctors can replace a piece of her skull with a plastic implant, another encouraging step since the Arizona congresswoman was shot in the head more than four months ago.

Rep. Gabrielle Giffords left the hospital and boarded an airplane Wednesday to travel to Florida to see her husband's space shuttle launch in another important step in her long recovery from a bullet wound to the head suffered at a political event nearly four months ago.

Police stood guard as an ambulance took Rep. Gabrielle Giffords from intensive care to a rehabilitation hospital in Houston on Wednesday, an encouraging step that came after doctors upgraded her condition from serious to good.

The Houston hospital treating Rep. Gabrielle Giffords said Sunday that her condition is improving daily, but gave no update on the buildup of brain fluid that has kept the Arizona congresswoman in intensive care.